Mennonite Weekly Review

After a federal judge blocked controversial elements of Arizona’s immigration law, Mennonite Church USA is still weighing whether to hold its 2013 convention in that city and will send a delegation there this month.

The injunction “does seem to increase the possibility that Mennonite Church USA may be able meet in Phoenix in 2013 to be a witness and to continue to speak out for the stranger in our land,” wrote Glen Guyton, MC USA director for constituent resources, in an e-mail.

MC USA is going forward with an Aug. 12-13 delegation in response to a request by Iglesia Menonita Hispana, a churchwide constituency group, that MC USA move the convention.

U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton put on hold July 28 the provision of the law requiring law enforcement officers to attempt to determine the immigration status of people they stop and have “reasonable suspicion” of lacking proper documents. Opponents argued that provision promoted racial profiling.

Without that provision and others, the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act took effect July 29.

The judge’s action does not change IMH’s request, as the sheriff of Phoenix’s county is still aggressive in prosecuting undocumented immigrants, and groups supporting the law will fight the decision, said Yvonne Díaz, IMH executive director, who will participate in the delegation.

“The environment, the sentiment is still the same,” she said. “It doesn’t go away overnight. It has been there for some time, and it will continue.”

Some IMH leaders expressed concern about having churchwide events in Phoenix in one-on-one conversations with denominational leaders before Arizona’s governor signed SB 1070 on April 23, Díaz said. The law prompted a formal request to move the 2013 convention, she said.

Díaz is worried that church members who are undocumented immigrants could get deported if they go to Arizona, she said.

“I am still hopeful that the wider church really understands what this whole thing is doing to immigrants’ lives,” Díaz said.